Emerald and Gold
by Yuri Ayato
Summary: Wherein Lubbock is the son of a wealthy businessman and typically prefers to remain isolated rather than have people pester him so as to gain his money rather than his friendship; and Leone is new to the United States and now works as a barista at a café that Lubbock frequents. [In Progress]
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Don't mind me, I'm just busy suffering emotionally. I need some happy AU now and this is probably the most overused theme for an AU so maybe this is super dumb but it's a happier deviation from the whole and-then-everyone-dies thing that Takahiro has going.**

**And uh I guess for ages, Lubba is fourteen, Mine is thirteen, Leone is sixteen, and Miss Najenda is like twenty-six. Does that work.**

**And since this has a modern-day setting, then Lubba's going to still be living with his parents, and there will be some side-effects of being born into such a wealthy family where he's given whatever and expected to do everything right. So yeahhhh.**

**Also I'm sorry that the title is very dumb.**

* * *

It was the café Lubbock always went to after school—partially to have an excuse not to straight home, because he honestly hated his home life almost as much as he hated the unnecessarily expensive private school he was forced to attend, and partially to think something other than a certain principal whom also doubled as his physical education teacher.

Being the son of a successful businessman wasn't the easiest or enjoyable thing ever, and neither was crushing on one of your teachers. He wanted nothing more than to run away, but the best he could do for the time being was spend hours every day at the café watching the pink-clad girl, the daughter of the couple who ran the place, go from table to table serving drinks and small snacks.

He wasn't sure what to call her, and he never got the nerve to ask out of fear of possibly upsetting her, since she was a short-fused bundle of dynamite drenched in gasoline, and as such, could easily be set off by even the smallest spark, and she really didn't seem to care much for him. He knew how to pronounce her name at least, he just didn't know how to spell it. M-I-N-E, as the English boy he was—but since _she_ was from the Netherlands and not Britain, maybe something like M-E-I-N, which looked more Dutch, and therefore more fitting, to him. She never wore a name-tag, which she shouldn't have to anyway, since she already introduced herself. She just didn't spell out her name.

_Kayleigh_ and _Kaylee_ are pronounced just the same, after all. Or maybe names seemed more insignificant to him than they did to most others. A rose isn't going to carry the same fragrance as a sunflower just because one referred to it as such. (He liked Shakespeare. A lot.)

But today seemed just a bit different than the others. According the the chatter, there was a new waitress to help out. He decided he could see what all the commotion was all about in a moment, once he got changed. He despised the clothes he always had to wear, so he always stuffed a casual outfit into his backpack to change into once he got to the café. It was far more comfortable, too, but he was sure he'd rather wearing it even if it wasn't.

Once he returned from the restroom, his regular clothing neatly folded and carefully put away in his bag so his parents wouldn't be able to tell he took it off in the first place, he sat at one of the tables to listen in on what was being said about the new waitress.

Apparently, she was hot, a former sex worker despite being a year or two shy of being a legal adult, and she had an attractive older brother around her age. She was single and hardly interested in anything other than a physical relationship, but there still remained no harm in taking a shot at something more than that.

Not that her employment history was anyone's business except her own. He respected other peoples's privacy enough to at least know that much. He sighed and rested his cheek against his fist, wondering when everyone would realize that all their talking about her might be a bit much.

Or until it was put to a stop, which it soon was. A high-pitched shout from behind the counter commanded everyone to shut up and sit down, or otherwise leave.

"If you insist on knowing things about her, maybe you should ask her yourselves instead of making up whatever crap that might seem fitting! And I swear, if you've got the nerve to crowd her, I'm going to personally kick you out and I'm not letting you back!"

Lubbock didn't know a single person who wasn't afraid of her, so it really wasn't any surprise that everyone did what they were asked. Rather, what was very furiously demanded. Again, she was the equivalent of a bundle of dynamite. Her petite build and her wardrobe made her look delicate and sweet, but she was quite the opposite.

He spent the next two or three hours—he didn't pay attention, he just knew when the alarm on his phone told him it was time to leave—reading and occasionally snacking on a slice of cake or a cookie. That was at six-thirty, so he probably still had some time to chat when he noticed someone sitting across from him at the small table.

He didn't move his gaze from the pages of the novel he was reading, but he could tell it was the new waitress.

"Hey, look up at me."

And so he did. And _God_, she was hot. Messy blond hair that reached a few inches above her shoulders, two locks of hair on either side on her head falling down to her chest, and gold eyes.

She smiled, reaching over the table to poke his nose. "You're cute. Your eyes are like emerald—have you heard anyone say that before?"

"No," he replied. His interest in this girl went no further than her appearance, and he was certain there was no chance of that ever changing. She was merely just better at talking to him than others, and probably more patient. No doubt she was after the same exact thing as everyone else who spoke to him. "But don't think I don't know what you're after. I'm not as naïve as people seem to like to think I am."

She gave a confused look, cocking her head to the side. "I'm not sure exactly what you're talking about... Mine doesn't seem to think very highly of you, but she does notice how much you hate what you wore into this place. It's near the end of my shift, there's not really anyone left here, so I'd like to know why you'd wear it at all if you hate."

"Are you stupid, playing dumb, or just new around here?"

"I moved here from Russia about a week ago. Guess you're one of the ones people bug a lot, aren't you?"

"Riiiight. That's a French accent you seem to have. If you're going to say you're from Russia, you could at least try to do the accent right."

She shrugged and leaned forward on her elbows. "My brother is Russian, I'm not. I haven't been living with him for much longer than a couple years, and I still don't know how to speak the language."

Lubbock still wasn't sure he completely believed her, but she did seem to have more patience than most. No one even tried to hold a proper conversation with him unless they immediately got something from him. It had reached the point where he would either walk away with his fists angrily clenched at his sides or he would throw a bag of assorted coins from various countries and then ignoring anything else that person said. He was sick of wasting time on people who wanted nothing more from him than his money.

And so maybe he was being stupid when he decided to take a gamble and put any kind of trust in her.

"By the way, the name's Leone." She grinned at him as she introduced herself.

"Lubbock," the boy said simply. She seemed to be the rather informal type, and he wished he could be, so he decided that one of his more proper introductions wouldn't be the most appropriate.

"Oh! _Oh_!" Her eyes lit with realization and she covered her mouth with her hands. "Lubbock! You're that rich kid, aren't you? The one who doesn't like people."

"I don't like the people who are after my money. Other than that, I guess people are fine. I think I prefer books, though."

"Then maybe you'll like this." She pulled a booklet from her shirt and held it out to him. "My brother lends this to me before I do something potentially frustrating. I'm sure he won't mind if I give this to you for a while. You've probably already read it, but maybe not."

He took it and read the cover. _The Dhammapada_. His parents never allowed him to read anything religious, as they were always telling him that religion and business should never mix unless one was trying to make money through religious items. He'd decided that he was an atheist, though, at least for the time being. He just loved reading the words of wise people long passed, and that was the entire composition of _The Dhammapada_. He tried and failed to hide his excitement—nothing but a poker face was acceptable in business, or any of the other careers his parents pushed him to pursue—as he held the pocketbook against his chest.

"Thank you—I'll return it in perfect condition, I promise. I'd also like to thank your brother personally as well."

Leone giggled and ruffled his hair. "Hey, no big deal. I thought it might appeal to you, and my bro's a pretty nice guy."

For a moment, Lubbock had no clue how to respond. No one was bold enough to touch his hair, let alone mess it up. It just wasn't something a person had the audacity to do to a rich boy from a prestigious family. Either he'd whine to his parents to do something that would ruin the rest of your life or he would use his power to demolish your reputation himself.

But he hated his social standing, so it wasn't as if he'd do anything. He liked this girl too much anyway, even if he was one to be grateful to having everything served to him on a golden plate. So he pulled a comb from his bag, quickly fixed his hair, and gave her a smile. It wasn't a fake he put on as he politely obliged to what he was told so as to make all the adults he met like him, but instead a sincere one. She would have cared just as much about him if she'd bumped into him on the street on her way home, and so he couldn't help liking her.

She pulled out her little notepad and one of her pens, scribbling down an address and a number, then she ripped the paper out and handed it to him.

"If you wanna call, there's my number. And my address, if you wanna come over tomorrow. Friday nights, my bro makes some traditional Russian dish. He's super good in the kitchen, and everything he makes tastes amazing. Usually his friend comes over to join us, but he's pretty cool, too."

Lubbock gratefully took the slip of paper and tucked it in his backpack, just in time for his phone's alarm to begin going off. He let out a sigh as he dismissed it. "I have to go get changed and leave. If I take too long and my parents come by and see me wearing this, I'm dead."

"Yeah, I'd think so." She waved as he headed to the restroom to put on the detestable clothes his parents always made him wear. And when he left, she was waiting at the door to bid him a goodbye.

"One more thing," he said, walking backwards for a couple moments to talk to her.

"Yeah?"

"Your eyes—they're like gold. Especially now, with the sunset lighting them."

She gave nothing but a smile as he turned around and raced off to his house.

Miss Najenda was gentle without being too soft, efficient, and good at everything she tried; but Leone was kind, friendly, and generous.

At any rate, he thought that perhaps Miss Najenda didn't have anything on Leone.

* * *

**Author's Note: so should I add to this or...**


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note: Well I mean I guess it could be fun if I keep this going.**

**I hope you guys don't mind little mentions of a gay and a lesbian couple. It seems Leone's started referring to Tatsumi as Bulat's boyfriend, and apparently Mine and Sheele are the _dumb lesbians_. I don't even know if I'm going to do anything with it, I just looked back over it and I don't even remember typing it.**

**Ehhhh whatever I guess**

* * *

The next morning, Lubbock woke up to a loud, repetitive beeping. He shut off his alarm clock with a groan, kicking his blankets off and getting up. He opened up his closet, pulling out one of his ridiculously fancy outfits, quickly getting dressed and combing his hair, and then quickly rushed downstairs to have breakfast.

It was a rare occasion for him to seem happy at all, and it was even more rare to see him actually smiling even just slightly, so it didn't go unnoticed. His siblings probably noticed first, but probably didn't have the patience to even try pulling the pin on that grenade, since they remained silent. His father wasn't even present, and so the only person left to ask him about his change in mood was his mother.

Which was not something he wanted, but since it seemed the world hated him sometimes, she did.

"Did something happen yesterday? You seemed a bit happy last night at dinner as well."

No way he could tell the truth—he couldn't let himself be caught dead by his parents associating in such a friendly way with a complete stranger who wasn't from school or a child of someone at his father's workplace.

"I met someone at school," he answered vaguely, still more focused on his food than anything else. "She invited me to stay at her house for dinner tonight. May I?"

"I'm glad you've finally made a friend!"

_Oh, but you wouldn't be so happy if I told you she wasn't from that stupid school..._ he thought bitterly, but of course, he wasn't foolish enough to say that out loud. Instead, he quickly finished the food in front of him, politely wiped his mouth, and went upstairs to brush his teeth and to get his cellphone and backpack.

As he headed out the door, he waved to his mother. He would have bid farewell to his siblings as well, but seeing as they thought being older made them better than him, he preferred not having anything to do with them.

* * *

It felt school let out sooner than it usually did, and considering how packed it was at the café, he decided to wait outside for her shift to end. Not that he minded much—as long as he had a book, he could go hours without becoming bored or wanting to do anything else.

At the end of the day, Leone waved and grinned as she left the small building, then turned her attention to Lubbock.

"Been waiting long?" she asked, tossing him a peppermint candy.

He caught it and popped it in his mouth. "Only for a few hours." He slipped his book into his backpack and followed Leone as she began walking down the sidewalk.

She smiled up at the cloudy, light pinkish-orange sky. "Sorry we've gotta walk. I can't drive, and my bro doesn't have time to take a break from cooking and pick us up, especially since he's going to his teacher's house to help her with grading."

Lubbock shrugged. "I'm used to walking everywhere. My parents can't be bothered to take me anywhere. The youngest has to work the hardest to amount to anything."

She gave him a look of mixed sympathy and disbelief. He was expecting as much, since it was the most common reaction he got when he said things like that. Apparently that wasn't the way things worked in other families, and he couldn't help feeling a bit jealous of that. "Yeah, that's not how you determine worth. I'm not sure what you guys do, but normal people don't decide how much someone's worth by seeing how much pressure it takes to break them. Just saying."

"I never said it was right. It's just how it works out, I guess." He shrugged, but said nothing more. He preferred not to keep talking about it.

Apparently Leone could tell, because she switched the topic pretty quickly. "So what kinds of things do you do for fun?"

"Sewing, cooking, anything like that my mother thinks will be useful. I'm pretty good at football, but I don't play that much anymore."

She cocked her head to the side. "Football like they have here, or football like it's called in every other country?"

"The one they call soccer here." He shook his head. "I hate American football, and it's dirtier than I'd like, too. I know how that sounds, but sometimes getting dirty isn't all that enjoyable."

Leone lets out a snort of laughter. "You sound like my friend Bulat. He's always concerned with looking nice, and he really hates getting dirty most the time." She smirks. "...Well, I'm sure he doesn't mind if it's _Tatsumi_ getting him dirty..."

"Who's she? Another friend of yours?"

"_She_?" She laughs again. "No, Tatsumi's a guy. As if Bulat would ever do _that_ with a woman. Gross, he'd never even think about it!"

That made Lubbock wonder about how well he'd get along with this Bulat guy. No, he had nothing against gays—shout-out to Verizon Wireless for providing him with five gigabytes of data for himself each month, and a shout-out to his phone for having an incognito tab, because thanks to those two things, he had completely unrestricted access to social networking sites, Tumblr being his favorite. It was just that he was raised in a fairly homophobic environment, so it was a little weird for him. Like, to the point where he probably wouldn't even get off on two women.

It served as a quick reminder to work on that.

Apparently, he hesitated a bit longer than he thought he did, because Leone looked at him with an expression of mild curiosity and accusation. "There a problem? You one of those guys who jacks off to lesbians and then goes back around and talks shit about gay men? News flash—that's called fetishizing, not accepting, so don't even try that in defense."

"No, no!" Lubbock wasn't even aware of all his dumb hand gestures as he shook his head, frantically trying to figure out how to explain himself. "It's more like...my parents are homophobic, and even the concept of lesbians is still kinda weird. I'm a little sick of it all, since I guess it's the same as the way a guy like me looks at a girl, I just don't get it. I swear to God, I'm trying."

Leone burst out laughing, and even had to stop for a moment because of how hard she was laughing. "_What_? Who raised you?! That is the most hilarious thing I've heard all week and I take orders at a café! Do you have any idea the kinds of things I hear every single day?"

"Is it really this funny?"

"_Duh_! No straight teenage boy thinks like that, Lubba!" Just as soon as she composed herself, she went into another fit of giggles.

Lubbock knew that. His parents made a mistake giving him a device that let him do whatever he wanted on the Internet, since they seemed to be intent on forcing all their opinions onto him. But even with that, he still knew there were some views that needed fixing—he just didn't know he would ever admit that out loud.

"Yeah, I'm still working on that..." He sighed and shoved his hands in his pockets. He knew it probably looked stupid, doing that with the kind of clothes he was wearing, but he didn't really care. It already looked pretty out of place for someone dressed so nicely to be walking home with a girl whose apron was covered in splotches of coffee and tea, and it wasn't as if he cared about appearance like he was always told he should.

And if word of this got back to his parents, he wanted to see them try to keep him away from ordinary people, because he knew for a fact that was one thing they were _not_ taking from him.

"Maybe some time at my place could fix that right up. We've got dumb lesbians, and Bulat and his boyfriend, and I'm pretty sure one of my brother's friends is gay. But get this—a girly lesbian who's getting a prosthetic arm, and she would make, like, fifty Facebook accounts just to Like the Starbucks page, _and_ she's a Justice League fanatic. Just let that sink in."

None of that added up, really—how many people quite like that did you meet on a regular basis, after all? Lubbock wasn't sure if he wanted to get to know that girl or not.

"Pretty strange, huh?" she chuckled. "But I'm not sure you'll get to meet her tonight, since my brother said something about her getting a cold a couple days ago. It's been going around the school, so maybe you'll have to wait until next Friday to see any of the people he hangs out with. They're pretty cool, though."

"What about your friends?"

"Oh, they're the _best_. My best friend is gay, I'd bet fifty bucks Tatsumi is his boyfriend even though he hasn't even figured out he isn't straight, Mine's just an angry lesbian but she hates it when I say that, Sheele's a super clumsy airhead, and Akame is really quiet but you're dead if you underestimate her. They're great people, I can't wait to introduce them all to you." She grinned. "What about yours?"

Lubbock rolled his eyes and shook his head as if her question was absolutely ridiculous. But instead of saying he didn't have any, he just replied, "She's pretty cool. Maybe a little obnoxious, but I think I would be, too, if I had that kind of freedom. And I'd take her over anyone else any day."

"Do you seriously not have any other friends?"

"Who wants to be friends with someone when they can just try to talk their way into a bit of money?" He shrugged.

"Who wants the person's money when you can just be friends?" Leone sounded almost irritated as she countered the question. "I'm not saying I've never mooched a few dollars from random people here and there, but _seriously_."

He shrugged again. "People don't think about anyone but themselves. I remember Science class a couple years back. We had a lesson on animal instincts, and yet not even the teacher could realize that most people are no better when it comes to following instincts. How blind do you have to be see that most people only do nice things because they'd feel guilty if they didn't, or that they just disregard everyone around them?" He gave an exaggerated gag. "And then I had to listen to how I'm never getting a proper job if I don't accept it."

"Ugh, kill me now." She giggled and threw her arm around Lubbock's shoulders. "But you know what that means, right? You've gotta prove your parents wrong! Stop being so isolated, stop being so guarded with everyone else, and do a better job at life than they ever could!"

"That's a lot easier said than done."

"So start sooner rather than later." She grabbed his arm and began dragging him along as she sprinted down the sidewalk. "I live in the apartment complex right over here on this corner! Come on!"

He struggled to keep up with her and to keep from tripping over his own feet—damn, she was fast!

The building really didn't look like much, but for some reason, he felt some kind of odd excitement at actually being invited inside. He knew apartments weren't the nicest things ever, but at the same time, any kind of harmless new experience caught his interest, and he never actually thought he would find himself visiting such a cheap living space. His parents would kill him if one day he came home and announced that he'd visited this place.

Just another reason he hated them.

"I live all the way up on the sixth floor, and the elevator broke last night. There's a stairwell inside, but it's more fun to go up this way." She ran over to the stairs leading down from the fire exits of each level. "Sixth one up leads into my brother's room. Just try to be careful and don't knock anything over. I've never seen him actually angry, and hell if I ever want to."

Hesitantly, Lubbock followed her. He hoped his clothes wouldn't get dirty, because he had no clue how he would explain _that_. Even when he was back in kindergarten, he'd been scolded for spilling his chocolate milk on himself, and that was nine years ago. He even wiped the non-existent dust from the window sill as he entered a room with a pastel blue and white theme.

Leone motioned for him to leave the room quickly, and she shut the door quietly behind her.

"I'm not sure if it's the ball gag, the handcuffs, or the blindfold he's got in there, but he really doesn't like other people in his room," she whispered, before raising her voice as she walked into the kitchen, "So how's Seryuu and Wave doing?"

A young man—woman? Lubbock couldn't tell, but whatever, they were kinda cute—stood in front of the stove making what looked like small pancakes. "Ah...Seryuu keeps updating her status complaining about how she feels like she might be dying, and Wave mentioned his cold hitting him particularly hard today, so I wouldn't say they're necessarily doing very well. I made the syrniki with sunflower seeds, Seryuu's favorite, and I have some salmon in the oven for Wave. Even Miss Esdeath's had a small fever today, but I think I have something else for her."

"Don't you think you're overdoing this? Even just a little?"

He—she?—chuckled and shook their head. "Wave said the same thing, but it would be a shame if I didn't do at least this much. I think I'll pick up some medicine as well."

Leone pulled a five-dollar bill from her pocket. "Here, use something from my tips. We're already tight on money, so don't go spending from the money we actually _work_ for."

_Oh_, this was Leone's brother. Duh—why had he even had to give it any thought? The guy had a rather androgynous female appearance, but honestly... At least he'd realized before he said something stupid, like address him as _ma'am_.

"By the way, this is my friend, Lubba!" She changed the subject quickly, pulling Lubbock to stand in front of her. "He's the one I was talking about last night! Lubba, this is my brother, Run."

The young man looked almost curious. "And someone like you cared enough to visit this place? I do hope she didn't pester you into coming here."

"Excuse you, he came because I invited him." She glanced at him as he pulled at the collar of his shirt. "And by the way, the bathroom is down the hallway, the first door on your left."

With a nod, he headed to the bathroom. He'd had quite enough of his uncomfortable clothes, and he couldn't get changed out of them quickly enough. He wasn't sure what else to do with his backpack, so he just put it back over one of his shoulders.

When he returned to the kitchen, Run had apparently left already, and Leone was talking to someone on the phone.

"I'm telling you, I never said that! I don't know _what_ that angry lesbian thinks I've been saying, but that's a little much even for me. ... Oh, so she thought it would be good to tell _you_ to tell me that she's not coming? And besides, we're having syrniki of all things tonight—you'd think she'd at least come to take our food. ... It's not like I _want_ that, because Akame already eats like she's pregnant with quadruplets, but it just seems like she'd take a few cakes and leave. ... What do you _mean_ Bulat's not coming? Isn't it like your job as his boyfriend to— ... Did you just deny being his boyfriend _and_ say you're watching a movie with him in the same sentence? ... It doesn't even matter if it's _The Hobbit_! ... Fine, whatever, we can make do with just Akame and Sheele." She clicked her tongue and slammed the phone back onto its stand.

"What was that all about?"

"Tatsumi's bailing to watch a movie with his totally-not-boyfriend, and Mine's upset with me for some reason. Looks like only Sheele and Akame are showing up tonight. Whatever, I guess it's better not to overwhelm you by introducing you to everyone all at once anyway."

As if on cue, the doorbell rang, and Leone hurried to answer it. On the doorstep were two girls, one dressed in black and red, and the other in lilac and a darker shade of purple. The one in black gave only a small wave as she entered, while the one in purple smiled and held out her hand.

"My name is Sheele," she said. "You must be Lubbock, right?"

"Yeah." He shook her hand, barely keeping himself from politely bowing as he had been taught to do. "And her...that's Akame?"

"Yes, that's her. She might seem a bit quiet, but she's just one of those people who doesn't talk very much. Don't worry about her not liking you—she might like staying quiet, but it's obvious when she doesn't like someone."

"Yeah, I get that."

Leone came back from the kitchen carrying four plates. Akame quickly grabbed the one stacked with an inedible amount of pancake-things, Sheele took the one with the fewest, and Leone gave Lubbock just as much as she was having.

"Hey, what are these things?" he asked, taking a small bite of one.

"It's called syrniki. It's basically a cheese pancake," Leone explained. "There's sunflower seeds in it, too, since Run wanted to make Seryuu's favorite tonight. How's it taste?"

"Weird. Not really a bad weird, but...I don't think I've ever tried anything quite like this."

"Funny, I can't cook. My parents can, he can, and then I almost set the entire place on fire trying to cook Spaghetti-O's. And I'm saying they can cook _really_ well. It's like it runs in their family or something."

For a moment, Lubbock considered making some comment about it, but soon decided saying things regarding her family wasn't his place, especially since she made it sound like she wasn't born into it.

"I'm sure you could learn if you tried hard enough," Sheele insisted.

Akame nodded and stopped stuffing the food into her mouth long enough to add, "I'd eat whatever you make if you decide to try cooking."

Leone chuckled. "Of course _you_ would, and you'd enjoy it while everyone else would throw it all back up."

She didn't reply, but had a _fair enough_ kind of expression.

"So anyway, I went sifting through the movies, and I've found a few I didn't even know we had. There's _Twilight_, why the hell do we even own that one, _The Notebook_, that's gross, _Die Hard_, a nice wholesome Christmas movie, _The Matrix_, Sheele probably shouldn't be allowed to watch this one, and _Session 9_, which will fuck the shit out of your brain. Personally, I like _Die Hard_ the best, and since most guys like explosions..."

While Sheele looked vaguely afraid of a movie with a title like that, Akame seemed mildly interested. Leone seemed to want to watch it, and since Lubbock really didn't have any kind of preference, the majority won.

And so Leone started the movie, everyone still working on eating their dinner, except Akame, who had finished eating and had made a trip to the kitchen to get an entire back of leeks and a bowl of soy sauce.

* * *

**Author's Note: I'm sorry this is so long. And I hope this is still interesting because I'm honestly really worried it's not.**

**Also I'm not sure if soy sauce and leeks is a legit thing in Japan? I just know my friend Kazuko snacks on it a lot, so I guess it must taste good.**

**And I've never actually seen any of the movies mentioned here aside from The Matrix and Session 9, and I'm currently reading the first book in Twilight. I just know a vague thing or two about the other ones and made an assumption of what Leone would think of them soo...**


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: ****I apologize for for taking a little over a week, it's called _I got the first volume of DanMachi and I can't stop writing dumb little drabbles about Aiz and Bell_. It's also called _when did World of Warcraft start dominating every aspect of my life and why am I so addicted to Wranduin_. Aaaand it's also called _I'm trying to read a 75,000-word fic between everything else to give some constructive criticism and I'm somehow only two chapters through it_.**

* * *

Lubbock woke the next morning to the sound of his phone ringing. Panicking, he scrambled to answer it, and heard his mother's voice on the other end.

"Lubbock! Where are you?! You said you were only going over for dinner! What do you think you're doing?! I never gave you permission to spend the night!"

"Yes, I understand that." He felt a bit guilty, though he knew he really shouldn't. It wasn't as if he mattered very much to her anyway. "I'm not entirely sure what happened. I began feeling a bit lightheaded, so I was told to lie down. I hadn't meant to get a night's sleep, I swear."

The woman on the other line huffed. "That's not everything. Lubbock, you have half an hour to get home or I'm taking away whatever freedom you have for the next four years!"

_Half an hour?_ He inwardly protested that it was a forty-five-minute walk home from where he was staying. Maybe if he ran the whole way, he could be home in under the time limit. "Y-yes, Ma'am. I'll be there as soon as possible."

The phone clicked as she hung up. He grabbed his backpack, got ready to return home, and rushed out the door. He could call Leone later and explain the situation to her. He probably should have left a note for her and Run, but he didn't really have time for that.

* * *

Once he got home, he was panting, trying to catch his breath.

"I-I'm sorry for taking so long..."

"As you rightfully should be." His mother glared and turned around to go to her office, motioning for him to follow. She sat at her desk and pulled out a ruler. "Sit down, hands on the desk."

Without a word, Lubbock did as he was told. She slammed the stick down on his knuckles, causing him to flinch away just slightly. He kept his eyes down, afraid to meet his mother's gaze as she smacked his knuckles again and again, fourteen times.

"Now tell me why you thought it was appropriate not to tell me before staying the night at a friend's house?"

"I told you—I had only meant to take a nap. I didn't realize—"

_Smack._

She hit his knuckles again. "Learn to be more careful. Now, I have another question. Why is it that one of your brothers brought home a rumor about the principal being pregnant?"

"I-I don't understand why that's a big deal, but if it's of any importance, I'm beginning to believe she's in a relationship with her assistant."

"That isn't the point. The rumor is that she's pregnant and you're the father. Lubbock, you're fourteen years old, and there are people at your school who honestly believe that you are the father of your principal's child. Do you understand how much this could harm your reputation? Even more than that, do you understand how much this could harm our family name?"

"I don't know where that even came from! I mean, Miss Najenda trusts me with a lot, and I was always helping her out before Mister Susanoo was hired...b-but there's nothing more to it than that!"

Instead of the ruler this time, his mother slapped him across the face with the back of her hand. "So where did those rumors come from, if you were just a helper?"

"I don't have any idea. I'm just as shocked by this as you are..."

"That's a lie, but I suppose if you're going to be so stubborn, I don't even want to look at you." She spun around in her office chair, facing away from him. "Go to your room. You're not allowed out for any reason until dinnertime. And at dinner, I don't want to hear you say a word."

With a silent nod, though she couldn't even see it anyway, he got up and headed upstairs to his room. He threw his backpack on the floor and collapsed onto his bed.

It wasn't fair. Normal kids his age could stay with their friends for a night or two at a time, they weren't kept on such a ridiculously tight leash, they didn't have to worry about doing everything absolutely perfectly, they weren't hit for making little mistakes... And the rumor at school—if Miss Najenda heard it, that could very well mark the end of his life. It was a dumb crush, and he hadn't even let it become obvious.

As if she even seemed like one who would want kids anytime soon.

He brought his knees up to his chest with a heavy sigh, pulled his blankets over himself, and went to sleep.

* * *

When he woke up again, there was a golden light flooding in through his window. He squinted, trying to force his eyes to adjust to the brightness, and got up to close his drapes. Darkness seemed too nice at the time for him to want very much light to fill his room.

He tossed himself back down just in time to get a call. He checked the caller ID—the same number Leone had given him the day before. He slid the answer button across the screen and held it up to his ear.

"Hey."

"Yo! What happened this morning? I got up and you were gone. Then again, it's drafty and the couch isn't the most comfortable, so I can't say as I blame you."

"No, it wasn't that. My parents are pretty strict, and I got grounded for staying over." Lubbock let out a heavy sigh and rolled over, off his bed. It hardly even bothered him when he hit the floor, his head hitting the carpeted wood with a dull _thunk_.

"Yeah, I guess—Wait, what was that?"

"Either my head hitting the floor or my entire body hitting the floor. Take your pick, whichever would make you the least concerned."

"Lubba!" She sounded vaguely concerned, and almost a little bit whiny. "You're so much more apathetic than you were the past couple days... What's gotten into you?!"

"Don't worry about it. If you care to know how I act at home, this is it. It's kind of hard to find anything to care very much about when you're locked up like a prisoner, you know? I'd call my life more as _doing time_ than _growing up_. But you know parents—even if keeping you from developing an identity of your own is what they choose, they're obviously right. I'm still developing, so it's not like _I_ could possibly know what's best for _me_ and _my own damn life_."

"Oh, come on! You're not this depressed or negative, that's just your parents! You're not depressed and negative at all! And you know what? Screw them. Screw them right down to hell! There are two parts you can play in your own life. You can be the puppet, with all the strings attached to you, or you can be the puppeteer and hold onto the strings and beat the shit out of anyone who tries to take that control away!"

He let out another sigh. What she said was true. It wasn't as if he was an emotionless person unfamiliar with nothing aside from depression—that was just the person his household turned him into. And to think it was because he was so against their belief that he shouldn't amount to anything more than just a toy for them to play with.

Screw that, he could pull at and mess with the strings of fate better than they ever would be able to...

"Yeah, but maybe not for the next four years. Up until then, I'll be somewhere in the middle. I'll be the playwright's assistant, or a critic, or maybe I could be the makeup helper."

"Ugh, it won't matter if you wait til you're out of the house! Listen, I've been through more than a few knocks and rough patches, and if there's anything that's taught me, it's that the most important time to hold your ground against people is when you're going to have to see them all the time. Especially if you're living under them. Don't be such a pushover and maybe you'll get somewhere sooner!"

The only thing Lubbock knew how to respond with was a quiet groan. Eventually, after several minutes of silence, he regained a bit of motivation to be vocal again. "That's hard enough as it is, but it's pretty much impossible if I don't have any ground to stand on."

"There weren't magically countries from the beginning of time. People grabbed pieces of land, they _killed_ people over those pieces of land."

"Those people had _armies_. Do you know what I have? A cellphone, limited Internet access, and the smallest bedroom of the house. I'm not getting very far."

"Fine. You're right. You're getting nowhere. Have fun for the next few years, being the copilot in your own fucking life. Tell me how that goes when you stop trying to fit your parents' definition of _perfect_. I'm not opposed to helping my friends out, but if you're going to just flat-out refuse to even _try_ to make things better, then I really don't need to have to deal with that kind of negativity in my life again."

"I didn't mean—"

Before he could protest, the line went dead. She had hung up on him. In her defense, this wasn't him at all, and instead some half-assed effort he made to try to sit somewhere between his regular self and what kind of son his parents wanted. But he really couldn't help thinking that there was no way he'd be able to get to sleep that night. The last words he had heard Leone say were in a tone of oddly-mixed hurt and anger.

Maybe if he could just learn to pick a side—the _right_ side—and defend his right to remain on that side...

Just as he was about to try to go back to sleep, he heard his name being called. Dinnertime. He'd had enough of people, and he especially didn't want to interact with his family. Reluctantly, he tossed his phone on his bed and headed out to the dining room.

"Still upset?" his mother asked coldly. "You're allowed to answer me now—what happened to the attitude you had yesterday morning?"

Oh, God, he couldn't honestly believe he was about to do this. He was going to regret it, he was going to hate himself for the next week for it, he was going to suffer some horrible consequences for it. Every bit of his sanity and voice of reason was telling him it was stupid and that he should give some pathetic response like, _I suppose it's all the guilt I'm feeling from my recent actions._ But that was also the easy way out, and nothing worthwhile was ever going to be easy.

"You. You happened. You always happen. I can't enjoy anything. There's a reason it's so rare for you to see me happy. It's because I never did anything to deserve someone like you as a parent. Maybe if you at least pretended that you cared, that you think I'm worth something, I would know how to be happy. Think about that, and if you ever try to believe it's my fault, remember this—" He took in a deep breath. There was absolutely no coming back from swearing in his house. It was considered unprofessional and extremely disrespectful. "You're. So. _Fucking_. Wrong."

This was met by a backhanded slap across the face. It stung, but he refused to flinch away this time.

"Go up to your room! You aren't getting dinner tonight, and you'll be lucky if you get breakfast tomorrow morning."

With a glare, he turned around and went back upstairs. He'd made up his mind, and he wasn't going to go back to trying to make his parents like him. He was the only one who would have any say in his life, and that was his final decision. It was, as he had been aware for a long while, a rather toxic environment to be living it.

He was going to leave.

In the back of his closet, he always kept his regular clothes. Preferring t-shirts and jeans, he had the most of those, but he was beginning to regret not buying any jackets or sweaters before then, and there was no way he was about to steal clothes from someone else. He would just have to make do, though, and it shouldn't be too cold for very long if he traveled quickly enough.

Once he packed up his clothes, he reached under his bed to grab a wad of money he had been stealing little bits of for years, and had accumulated a few thousand dollars. He could get somewhere with that, if his parents found out where he was staying.

He slipped his bag under his bed to keep it out of sight in case someone else decided to come in and check on him. All that was left now was to wait—everyone should be asleep by midnight.

* * *

**Author's Note: Um. Next chapter will be a bit more positive. For now, I hope this is okay. Also I've got some dumb ideas for the next chapter too but they made a couple of my friends laugh so _whoop-de-doo_, why not use them?**


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: I'm still alive...but very grounded, and let me tell you, doing all your stuff on your cellphone at night when you should be sleeping is a bit suffering. (Wtf I literally just used the men's restroom at church. I am indeed a young man. I don't see why this is so difficult for them to understand.)**

**Ehhhh, who cares? Anyway, this chapter is nicer, no angst, nothing bad. Akame ga Kill Every Character You Love is already bad enough, we don't need anything too sad in the fanfiction, too.**

**Uh this gets kinda racy, but not the borderline-porn type of racy. It's solely for an attempt at humor but that's not a thing I'm good at so. (Also used to slip in a pairing I'm 98% sure hasn't even occurred to anyone.)**

**(I don't regret the ship mentioned in this. I cannot be stopped. Not now, not ever.)**

* * *

One-seventeen in the morning and Lubbock stood outside Run's bedroom window tapping at the thin glass with his index finger because he couldn't remember Leone's apartment number, if she had even mentioned it in the first place. But who even answered a tapping at their window—especially living in a shady part of town—before calling the police and without having a knife at the ready, anyway?

Run, apparently, as he pushed up the window, rubbing sleepily at his eyes. "Ah...Lubbock, it's rather early, to be visiting, isn't it?"

"Sorry, but it's kind of a long story. Leone still up?"

"She's out in the living room watching something with a friend of hers, I believe. Something about gay angels and hot men, I believe, so I suppose you should be prepared to walk into something rather questionable."

"Yeah, thanks." He bowed respectfully—compulsively, as had become a habit of his—and headed to the main room of the small apartment.

Leone twisted her body to look over the back of the couch. "Get over here. I need someone else to watch TV with, since Tatsumi's fallen asleep on me!"

Not a _Hello._ Not a _I don't want to see your stupid face right now._ Not even a _What are you doing at my house without even calling in advance first?_

"Gay angels and hot men? No thanks, that doesn't really sound like something that would interest me."

She rolled her eyes and grabbed the remote to pause it. "Fine, fine, at least hang out with me a while, then." She glanced over at a brunet boy lying on the other side of the couch, bundled up in a brown coat and hugging a pillow against his chest. "Just don't fall asleep like he promised he wouldn't. Which brings up something kind of important—you hear any sounds from his general direction, and you're gonna wanna ignore it. He can get a bit loud."

Briefly, Lubbock considered asking something about it, but as proper and elegant as he had to act, he still was a teenage boy and was quickly able to understand what Leone was getting at.

"Anyway, you plan on staying very long?"

He shrugged and sat down on the back of the couch. "I need to stay here for a little bit. Like, a few weeks. Maybe a couple of months."

"Hey, congrats! You've gotten out of the house. That's good! And you've come to the right place. Run makes the best food, he talks on the phone like a teenage girl _with his Science teacher,_ I've been here for almost two weeks and I've already got the best friends ever, and back to Run—we could go through his whole room while he's out. And we can marathon crappy movies and _MST3K_ the hell out of them."

"_MST3K_?"

"You don't know what _MST3K_ is? Dude! Screw _Supernatural_, we're watching _Boggy Creek_!" She got up, grabbed his wrist, and looked over at Tatsumi. "That's a nice pillow, so if there's cum on it when I get back, I swear I'm going to kill you." She pulled him down the hallway to her room and showed him to a huge box of movies. "Ignore the really cheesy stuff, most of that is Run's. Honestly, he's the only guy out there who can watch a stupid rom-com and then get off on reading _Fifty Shades of Grey._ Which, by the way, you should stay far away from."

"Rape, abuse, all that fun stuff. Enljoying things like that in fiction is perfectly fine, but it's not really my thing. The writing is sub-par, too. It's mostly just an embarrassment to literature in general, in my opinion."

"Ah, yes, a fine young Englishman like yourself is far more interested in the words of ancient poets. You are utterly astounding when put beside an uncultured swine such as myself." The half-decent British accent mixed oddly with her usual slight French one, but that just made it more amusing.

Lubbock snorted. "Yeah, a fine young Englishman. _Right_."

"Nah, you could never fit that image." She grinned and ruffled his hair before returning to the movies in the box. Once she found what she was looking for, she showed him the cover of the case and half-dragged the boy back to the main room.

"What's that even about?"

"_Mystery Science Theater 3000_—there's a whole bunch of these. Basically, this guy is stuck up in space with a few robots, and he's being held there by an evil scientist who forces him to watch the worst movies in existence. He watches them with a couple of his robot friends and they just trash on the movies the entire time. It's one of the greatest forms of entertainment ever, and I can't believe you don't even know what it is." She got down on her knees in front of the DVD player and put the disc in. She went back to grab the remote and the screen switched, white letters in the corner saying _BD/DVD_ for a brief moment before disappearing.

Instead of sitting beside Leone, Lubbock decided to sit down on the back of the couch again. "People actually make things like that?"

"Yeah, and it's great." She grabbed his hips and pulled him down onto her lap. "Get down here, it's more comfortable."

He bit the inside of his mouth to keep from saying anything that had already earned him a hard slap at school, though he wasn't sure how much a girl like Leone would be bothered by the perverted comments that near-constantly ran through his head. She was probably in the higher tier of low-class, whereas no one below upper middle-class—so all the uptight ladies and gentleman who took things too seriously and were far too sensitive—was even allowed to attend his school, not on scholarship or otherwise. And she seemed like enough of a pervert herself, anyway.

But he still decided not to say anything and turn his attention to the movie instead.

* * *

It was late in the morning when he woke up—perhaps around eleven thirty or twelve, or possibly even later. He sat up and yawned, rubbing at his eyes.

"You up yet, Sleeping Beauty?"

Leone's voice came from across the room, where the blond was sprawled out on the floor with a book that had a foreign title. He didn't excel in French, but he could tell that it wasn't anything too happy.

"Sorry," he mumbled, vaguely aware of the English accent lacing his speech. It still took a conscious effort to stop using it, and it was a bit hard to make a conscious effort to do anything right after just waking up. "I can't get up without an alarm. I'm a bit useless and I failed to unpack last night. I'm not opposed to helping out with work around the house to make up for my little blunder."

"Dude, what? Who am I talking to? Who do you think you're talking to?"

"Oh. _Oh_. Force of habit, I guess..."

She rolled her eyes, tossing her book to the side and rolling onto her stomach to push herself up to her feet. "Just get changed and whatever. I'll get some cereal for you. Run's not here today, so hey, we could go through his stuff. Before one, though. Tatsumi went to the gym this morning, but one is when he and his not-boyfriend will be back here to pick us up to go on a hike. Well, pick _me_ up. You don't have to go."

"A hike?" Lubbock thought about it for a few moments. He was excellent at football, but only for about a quarter before he had to switch out and rest—and Leone looked as if she could be just fine after running five miles without any kind of break. But it was just a hike, surely nothing too extreme. "Yeah, sounds like fun."

"Hell yeah!" She grinned. "I'll be right back. And you'll have to eat fast. It's more fun to go through someone else's stuff when you've got an accomplice!"

As she headed to the kitchenette, he quickly pulled off his clothing and dressed in something clean in easily under a minute. It was one of the few talents he had picked up from years of rushing to get ready in the morning.

"Damn, that was fast," Leone chucked as she handed him a bowl of an extremely generic version of Cheerios.

Another talent was eating extremely quickly, on the mornings when he chose to eat at all. He brought the bowl up to his mouth, drinking the milk and swallowing the generic Cheerios along with it. Cereal was much simpler than what he was used to being served for breakfast, and contrary to most other opinions, it was a nice change from what he was used to and most certainly wouldn't get boring too quickly.

He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and leaned into the kitchen to throw the bowl into the sink.

"Ready now?"

"Ready." He returned the mischievous grin on Leone's face as he followed her down the short hallway and into her brother's room.

"You look under his bed and I'll check the closet. Those are the two places he will never talk about. He's definitely hiding something! I already know he's got some sex toys and shit, but I wonder what else..."

"We're about to find out." Lubbock got down on his hands and knees, pu pushing up the sheet that draped over the bed and hid whatever was underneath it and tucking it under the mattress. And holy crap—a wide assortment of novels. Among the collection were titles like_ The Whippingham Papers_, _The Way of a Man with a Maid_, _The Romance of Lust_, and even one entitled—

"_Lolita_. I've found _Lolita_. What, is your brother a pedophile? Eugh."

"The hell? I don't even know what he's doing with something like that. I've known him for seven years, and I can tell you, he's into chics with big tits and mature bodies. Maybe it's just the smut that—" She cut herself off with a string of barely-audible cuss words, voice trembling slightly as she tried to suppress laughter. "Lubba, get over here! Oh my God...!"

Lubbock got up from the floor and quickly stumbled over to the closet. "What is it?"

"I know for complete sure he kept a ball gag, a whip, a collar, and a leash in here. I was just messing around when I first found all of that, and then he swore me to secrecy, and I promised to forget about it all. He had hella nice lingerie in here, too, but it's a little suspicious that it was white and gold."

"Then what'd he do with it? Where else is there to put it?"

"Don't know, but I might have some idea." She gasped suddenly and pulled a pair of sky blue panties with black lace from the back of the closet. "Oh my God! These would fit me! She's only like a size smaller than I am, and the color scheme matches up, so... Christ, these belong to his teacher!"

"I thought that was just something you'd hear rumors about or see on the telly. You're sure those are hers?"

"Yeah, totally hers. Right color scheme, right size. And he said he was going over to Miss Esdeath's house to help grade tests, but I bet that's where all the kinky shit's at." She chucked, tossing the panties back where she picked them up from. "Can't say as I blame him. Completely into dick, but hey, if I absolutely _had_ to bang a chic, it'd have to be her. ...Huh, I wonder how long it takes for him to come undone..."

Before anything else could be said, there was a knock at the door. Lubbock assumed it must have been Tatsumi.

"Coming!" Leone called, turning to leave the room.

Lubbock took a step back to get out of her way, but somehow managed to trip them both in the process. The blond landed on top of him—elbows on either side of his head, breasts pressing against his chest, and one of her knees between his legs.

"...U-uh..." he stuttered, not really sure of what to say. "Are we..."

"Having a moment?" Leone finished as she got to her feet and helped him up as well. "Yeah, I guess it's right to call it that. Sorry, I totally just fell right over!"

"No reason to apologize, it was kind of just... Hey, there are people at the door. It's kind of impolite to keep your guests waiting and all."

"Yeah, yeah. Nothing happened, right? So there's nothing to make shit awkward, now or later."

"Yeah... Nothing at all."

* * *

**Author's Note: (No Run you misunderstand, there's not even a lot of questionable content in that show)**

**This is hella shitty, sorry. Kinda short, too... ^-^;; I've been working on a novel and being busy trying to get ungrounded, and I got pretty sick. Is anyone even still interested in this after the little hiatus?**

**Mind joining me in the little headcanon corner? Run is very into erotica (especially the stuff directed at women) and very into sadomasochism because why not. I also think Leone would totally love stuff like Haven and Supernatural, with things like Boy Meets World on the side. (Also lots of MST3K.) But that's just me.**

**Er...I feel like there's just more and more swearing, too... I'm a bit of a foulmouthed person, so it just kinda seems natural to me, but is it too much? Should I cut back a bit?**

**Next chapter will have less author's notes (who's even reading all of these anyway I mean come on). But it will have some Tatsumi and Bulat, some Sayo and Ieyasu on a Skype call (does anyone even care though), and more Leone and Lubbock being dumb. I'll try getting it up like maybe next week or something.**

**(It's 3am so please forgive any mistakes)**


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note: LOOK WHO'S BACK. Did you miss me? It's me, Bell. Here I am, writing this fic again. It's been a while, huh? Sorry about that.**

**In the last chapter, I failed to explain something—Run reads things like Lolita for **_**coping reasons**_**, in the same way I read/write rape, abuse, and pedophilia to help me cope with trauma. I like being able to connect to the characters in little ways like that. (aka part of the reason Lubbock deals with abuse in this fic.)**

**Also, some of my gender and vague mental headcanons come up in this chapter! If any of you have gender/orientation/mental headcanons that deviate from "cis/straight/neurotypical," please message me about it. :3**

**Oh and! Lubbock is autistic, btw. It's kind of hinted at in this chapter. If you can spot all the symptoms, you win. If you guess the other autistic character in the chapter, you win twice.**

* * *

It was hotter than what was expected and Lubbock wasn't used to carrying heavy things. He wanted to throw all the luggage that he carried on his back to the ground, but he didn't. It was only one bag, filled with snacks and drinks for when they reached the top of the mountain. His stamina seemed pretty high when he was playing football—ahem, _soccer_, but he wasn't sure why Americans called it that—but this was a different sort of physical activity, and he didn't like it. Maybe he was just spoiled and didn't get out and do things like this often enough. Or maybe Leone and her friends were more active than most other people were.

Leone slowed down a bit so she could match Lubbock's pace. She put a hand on his head and grinned. "Too much for you?"

"I'm fine," he insisted, though he sounded a little breathless.

"Give me the bag."

He shook his head. He couldn't just dump all the weight onto her, especially when she was already carrying a bag herself. "No."

"Maybe we should just slow down," Tatsumi suggested. "Maybe going at his own pace would make it easier on him. Besides, we're not in any sort of rush, right?"

Leone snorted. "_What_? 'Let's slow down,' said Tatsumi _never_!"

Tatsumi waved his hand noncommittally in the air for a moment. He walked backwards a few paces to fall back with the other two. "Suck a dick." He flashed a playful grin.

"Lubbock's?"

"Sheele's," Bulat suggested, looking over his shoulder at the three of them.

"_You_ suck Sheele's!" she shot back, trying not to laugh.

"Gross." He wrinkled his nose and shook his head. "She's a girl."

Leone tossed a glance over at Lubbock. "What's with that look?"

What look? He straightened himself up and shook his head. He'd probably looked a little confused, like he hadn't been following completely. He couldn't really help it, though. He wasn't used to things like this.

"Sorry," he apologized.

"What?"

"You're pulling that face because you learned Sheele is trans, aren't you?" Tatsumi asked. It seemed that none of the three were upset about it, even if he wanted to kick himself in the shin as hard as he could. "Is the concept new to you?"

Lubbock could feel his cheeks flush with embarrassment. "Yeah... I'm just not used to it." He threw his hands up in front of him. "No judgment!"

"It's fine. From a trans person to you, it's all okay. Everyone's got a little bit of internalized transphobia."

Bulat seemed thoughtful for a moment. "Hey, does Run still have that essay it wrote on unlearning internalized prejudice?"

The blond shrugged. "Who knows? I'll ask him later."

What Bulat said took a moment to process what was said, but when it did, Lubbock's eyebrows knitted together in confusion. "Wait...what?"

No one seemed to understand.

After a moment, Bulat tried to help clear things up. "Run had to write a research paper for one of its classes about a year ago. It chose to write about internalized bullshit that people need to learn to get rid of. It's a really good writer—the essay was really professional."

"No, it's not that..." What was a polite way to state that he'd never heard _it_ pronouns used for another human being before? It was probably problematic of him, but it just seemed so strange.

After a moment, it looked like the problem seemed to click. "Am I misgendering him? I've used those pronouns for him since I first met him, and if he changed them, I didn't get the memo."

Leone shook her head. "No, no, he still uses _it_, no worries." Her hand came down on Lubbock's head once again, ruffling his hair a little. He couldn't help pushing his head up a little into her touch. "I think our friend here has just never heard those pronouns."

"Sorry," Lubbock mumbled. Hanging out with Leone and her friends was proving to be embarrassing for him—but it was okay, because he was realizing that there were things that he needed to change. These people weren't rude and had been patient with him so far.

"It's cool." Tatsumi grinned at him. "No harm done, right?"

He still couldn't help feeling bad, but Tatsumi didn't seem to like that. He put a hand on Lubbock's shoulder, only to have the green-haired boy flinch away. He hated how he did that, but he could never keep himself from doing it. There was just something about being touched by someone he didn't know very well, especially when he didn't give them permission for physical contact—though he probably wouldn't have minded if it had been his head getting touched.

"Did that hurt?" Tatsumi asked, looking a bit concerned. Lubbock wished he knew how to read expressions properly, because it looked as if there was something more than just concern there.

He shook his head. "No. I'm just like that. My parents say I'm _weird_. I have strange habits, I do strange things..."

"That's not very nice of her," Bulat put in. "Even if the things you do seem out of place, I still think you're pretty cool. I don't think your parents know what they're talking about."

"Exactly!" Leone agreed.

Tatsumi looked at Lubbock with what was probably curiosity, and Lubbock fidgeted with his fingers the way he usually did when he got nervous.

"Are you...?" The brunet shook his head, closing his eyes for a second or two. What was he going to say? The other boy wasn't sure, because the rest of the question never came. "Never mind."

Leone leaned over and whispered something in Tatsumi's ear, and he nodded. Lubbock wondered what she had said.

"What were you going to say?" he asked.

Tatsumi shook his head. "Nothing."

Seeming to agree, the blond gave a smile. "Nothing to worry about."

He didn't push it any further.

* * *

When they reached the top of the mountain, Lubbock was ready to collapse. Leone and Bulat didn't seem to be tired at all, but Tatsumi was a panting a little bit. Lubbock sat down on the ground and slipped off the straps of the backpack. He unzipped it and pulled out a bottle of water, downing over half of it easily.

Tatsumi sat Indian-style on the ground across from the green-haired boy, and he pulled out his phone. Apparently there was still reception, because he seemed to be using it just fine. "Hey, I'm going to call Sayo and Ieyasu to show them where we are."

Leone sat down beside Lubbock, while Bulat sat beside Tatsumi.

"Sounds like a plan," Bulat said, watching the brunet tap away on his phone screen.

There was a ringing sound that lasted only a few seconds before a cheerful feminine voice came through the phone's speakers. "_Moshi moshi, Tatsu-chan_!"

He smiled and spoke in what sounded like Japanese for a few minutes before switching to English again. "I'm at the top of a small mountain with a few of my friends right now. I wanted to show you. Where's Ieyasu-kun?"

"He'll be over in a minute. It's only six in the morning here!"

Bulat put his arm around Tatsumi's shoulders and leaned in, holding up two fingers for the peace sign. "It's like a double date."

"D-double date?!" Tatsumi stuttered, his face going red. Lubbock couldn't blame him—he probably blushed a little, too. "I wouldn't say that..."

"You and Tatsu-chan." The girl on the call—Tatsumi had called her Sayo, right?—sounded interested, and she giggled at the end of the sentence. "Who are the other two?"

Bulat seemed pleased with himself, which only made Sayo giggle again. "Leone and her friend, Lubbock."

"Leone-san is so pretty, she could probably get a date with anyone!"

Leone grinned. "Thanks."

"_Daijoubu_. But who's Lubbock-san?"

Tatsumi hit a button and gave a thumbs-up. "I switched it to the back camera. She can see you."

Lubbock's hands flapped once before he could keep from doing it, and his cheeks flushed slightly with embarrassment. He decided on just giving a small wave. "I'm Lubbock."

"_Sayo desu_!" She sounded very cheerful and happy. "I'm Sayo. I've been friends with Tatsumi ever since we were little kids. He's very kind and sweet."

"Let me see her." Lubbock crawled over to look at the screen of Tatsumi's smartphone, for once not caring if he got his pants dirty. The girl displayed was beautiful. She had long black hair and dark eyes, and in her hair was a pink flower hair-pin. "You're cute."

She looked away from the screen with a look of embarrassment, then pulled her hair over her shoulders so she could hide the lower half of her face. "You're cute, too. _Kawaii desu_."

"Stop that," Leone laughed. She came up behind Lubbock, and Tatsumi switched it back to the front camera. She put an arm over his shoulders and pressed a kiss into his hair. "Lubba's mine."

"Oh?" Sayo brightened even more, giving them all a happy grin. "I'm happy for you!"

"Well, we're not, like—Um..."

"Nothing's official yet," Bulat stated simply.

"Bulat-san is friends with them, too?" Sayo asked. "You know their relationship?"

He shrugged. "Friends of Leone are my friends, too."

"How cute!"

There was the sound of a door opening, accompanied by a whisper-yell. "Tatsumi-kun?" A boy with messy brown hair and brown eyes showed up on camera, giving a toothy grin and holding up a peace sign with each hand. "Oh, you've got a crew! Who's the new kid?" His accent was a lot heavier than Sayo's, and it was a little difficult to understand him.

It took Lubbock a minute to process that the boy on-screen was referring to him. He would have introduced himself if he would have realized, but Tatsumi got to it first. "This is our friend, Lubbock. He and Leone met at a cafe here, and now they're—Well, it's personal, so I shouldn't say anything."

"Got it." He flashed a thumbs-up. "It's nice to see Bulat-kun and Leone-chan again, though! How have you guys been?"

"Hanging out with my guy," Bulat said, stealing a kiss on Tatsumi's cheek.

The brunet jerked so hard that he dropped his phone and fell into Lubbock. Lubbock was caught off-guard and fell as well. "Don't just _do_ things like that!"

Laughter came from the phone's speakers, and Bulat looked amused.

"Careful, gays," Leone warned, but it was a little late for that.

"You mean _guys_," Tatsumi mumbled, getting up.

"No, I means _gays_."

"Lubbock is straight."

Bulat ran his fingers through his hair and made finger guns as Lubbock. "I could fix that."

Lubbock shook his head and dusted off his shirt. "No thank you."

"I was kidding."

"Bulat can make me gay anyday."

"Leave it up to a _yarichin_ to do that," Sayo giggled. "Bulat-san is definitely a _yarichin_."

Lubbock didn't know what that meant, but Bulat seemed to find it amusing, at least. "I can't even deny that one."

The next few hours were spent laughing and playing around, chatting with Sayo and Ieyasu. It was a perfect opportunity for Lubbock to get to know everyone a bit better, even if socializing with more than three people was a little much for him.

* * *

As Bulat was driving them home, Leone's phone beeped to signal that she had gotten a text. She flipped her phone open and read it, and immediately looked panicked.

"Turn around," she said. Her words came out sternly. "You can't take me and Lubba home."

"Why not?" Bulat asked.

"The police are at our apartment. Run says they're trying to track Lubba down and take him home."

"Shit," Lubbock muttered. There was a sick feeling in his stomach and he felt like he was about to puke. "I can't go back there."

"That's why we're taking you to my place," Tatsumi put in. "Don't worry. We won't let them take you."

* * *

**Author's Note: Okay. So when you run away, you get the cops called. And if you refuse to go home, you get admitted into a mental hospital. CPS gets called, they come out, check out your home. They decide if you get to go home or not. If not, they try to find family who will take you, but if they can't, you go into the foster care system. (He'll have company! There are a couple other characters in foster care who will be good to Lubbock.)**

**Also you get bonus points if you know (without looking it up) what a "yarichin" is.**


End file.
